Sex Offender's Tears Fail To Move Bucks Judge

April 26, 1986|by HAL MARCOVITZ, The Morning Call

Saying that Allen Scott Ewing was a "menace to society and anyone in the growing-up process," Bucks County Judge Kenneth G. Biehn yesterday sentenced the convicted sex offender to a 10- to 20-year state penitentiary term.

Because the sentence will run consecutively to a separate 10- to 20-year term for an unrelated case, the alleged leader of the child sex and pornography ring that operated out of a Tinicum Township cabin will not be eligible for parole until the year 2005.

"I don't think you have remorse. When you cry, you cry for yourself," Biehn told a sobbing Ewing. "You give new meaning to the word insensitive."

Ewing was returned shortly after the court session to Huntingdon State Prison, where he has been incarcerated since his 1985 conviction for forcible rape of five young Bensalem Township boys.

The 35-year-old former photographer from Philadelphia was one of four adults arrested last year in the Tinicum case. Police alleged that Ewing and his co-conspirators lured young boys to the cabin at Mount Airy and Dark Hollow roads for sex purposes. More than 2,700 sexually explicit photographs were found in the cabin.

Ewing was convicted in February on 697 sex-related charges stemming from the Tinicum case. He had served as his own attorney.

Parents of three of the victims testified during the sentencing hearing. Each parent told Biehn that their children were suffering psychological wounds from the sexual abuses.

"He took my baby boy and ruined his life," said one anguished mother.

Ewing, who at times sobbed uncontrollably, told Biehn that he had been a victim of sexual abuse himself as a juvenile.

"I don't offer that statement as an excuse for my actions. I offer it as a reason for the court to understand what happened," Ewing said.

The defendant said that at the time he committed the abuses, he did not believe he was taking part in actions that could be considered illegal. Ewing said he tried to develop big brother/little brother relations with the boys by taking them on outings and photographing them for legitimate modeling jobs.

"It just simply wasn't meant to happen the way it did," said Ewing.

But Biehn told Ewing that he was trying to justify the illegal acts.

"What you did was provide good times and affection to kids only to lead them into a trap," said the judge. "Frankly, all I've heard you say in your tears is you regret losing the trust of the kids. You won't say what they lost."

Deputy District Attorney Wallace H. Bateman said, "We're certainly pleased with the sentence. Ewing believes what he says. He was rationalizing his behavior."

The three other adults accused in the ring have all pleaded guilty. They include Frank Williams, of New Castle County, Del., who has been sentenced to five years in prison; Ted Trask of Philadelphia, who has yet to be sentenced, and James A. Patterson of Bristol Township, Bucks County, who has also not been sentenced.